EDITORIAL - A year with no SALs is enough time, don't you think?

Finally, the Office of the Ombudsman has allowed the release of the statements of assets and liabilities of public officials, documents that for years have been freely made public as a measured of transparency in government.

But this welcome development should not overwhelm or set aside the nagging questions as to why the clampdown was imposed in the first place. Just because we have been freed does not justify ignoring why we were imprisoned at all.

Of course the road to finding out what really prompted the padlocking of those public documents is long. And it is littered with obstacles, including the anticipated hemming and hawing of officials who, for one reason or another, have not handled the situation well.

The biggest suspicion, of course, is that the Office of the Ombudsman was not acting independently on this one. For if left to its own devices, nobody would have thought the anti-graft agency would do the very thing it is sworn to fight or guard against.

And if it is true that fish are caught by the mouth, then we are seeing the beginning of a bountiful harvest. Just listen to how some Ombudsman officials are starting to talk. You can immediately tell they are, well, talking through their teeth.

One highly-placed official, in a sorry attempt at a limp excuse, said the clampdown on the release of the statements of assets and liabilities of public officials was resorted to by the Office of the Ombudsman to protect these officials from -- listen to this -- robbers.

Ha ha ha. Ho ho ho. He he he. The Ombudsman protecting public officials from robbers? Since when has the Office of the Ombudsman confused itself as the Philippine National Police? They have a term in psychiatry to describe split-personalities but go ask a shrink yourself.

And why protect public officials from robbers when the common perception is that some of the biggest robbers are public officials themselves? If Ombudsman officials have nothing to say, they better not say anything at all. The fish, remember?

Back to that big suspicion now agitating the minds of the public. The clampdown on any release of statements of assets and liabilities of public officials ran for more than a year. Enough time, don't you think, to clean up what needs to be cleaned?